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VATICAN CITY — In the latest Vatican Voices podcast, Father Robert Prevost, Prior General of the Augustinian Order, talks about the dominance of mass media in the West and the church’s response to secular culture.

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This is very informative but it goes by so fast that we really don’t contemplate fully, “Their evangelizing was successful in great part because they understood the foundations of social communication appropriate to the world in which they lived. Consequently they understood with great precision the techniques through which popular religious and ethical imaginations of their day were manipulated by the centers of secular power.”

Vice President Biden manipulated the religious and ethical imaginations of our people by saying while he subscribes to the Church’s teachings on abortion he doesn’t believe he should impose them on others. That’s manipulation of religious and ethical imagination. So was his denial that the administration was imposing on the religious freedom of the Church.

President Obama spouts his love for the poor and respect for human dignity while promoting abortion worldwide and especially in the black community as a solution to poverty or a “mistake” one of his daughters might make. Catholics, including many nuns and priests, proclaim him to be “pro-life” on the basis of the “Seamless Garment” which, whatever the Cardinal’s original intent, has become a tool of religious and ethical manipulation.

Most importantly: Do we understand these techniques with great precision? Because that is exactly what Fr Provost means by “social communication” and how it is being used to manipulate religious and ethical imagination. It occurs in our colleges. on TV, and within our parishes! It is the abuse of our Catholic values system by turning it sideways. Unless we really, “with great precision” understand and learn to counter “the techniques through which popular religious and ethical imaginations” of OUR day are being “manipulated” we will not be successful in the new evangelization!